


Russian Roulette Is Not the Same Without a Gun

by justkisa



Category: Football RPF, MCFC RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-06-30
Updated: 2012-06-30
Packaged: 2017-11-08 22:06:09
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,869
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/448048
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/justkisa/pseuds/justkisa
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>It never once occurred to Pablo that he should go easy on Silva in training.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Russian Roulette Is Not the Same Without a Gun

**Author's Note:**

> Written in response to [this prompt](http://footballkink2.livejournal.com/2971.html?thread=631451#t631451) on footballkink.

It never once occurs to Pablo to go easy on Silva in training. Not even after Pablo meets Silva and realizes that he’s barely, just barely, bigger than Leo. But Leo can take a kicking like no one else Pablo knows so he doesn’t think twice about clattering into Silva on the first day Silva trains with them. He actually knocks Silva down. Silva’s back on his feet before Pablo can even offer him a hand up.

“Christ, “ Lescott mutters, “Go easy, Zaba, we don’t want to break him on his first day.” 

Pablo just shakes his head. “He can take it.” 

Lescott looks doubtful. “Yeah, I don’t know.” 

No one else so much as bumps into Silva for the rest of training.

Later, in the dressing room, Pablo looks up and sees Silva rubbing at his shin. Silva’s frowning absently. There’s a bruise right in the middle of Silva’s shin. Pablo must have left it there when he’d tackled Silva. Pablo gets up and goes to sit next to Silva. He doesn’t apologize for the bruise. He just says, “So, what did you think?” 

Silva looks up from his leg and smiles a little. “I thought it would be harder, more--” He makes a vague gesture with his hands. “--you know.” He sounds almost disappointed. 

Pablo bumps his shoulder against Silva’s. “Just wait ‘til tomorrow.” 

After Silva’s first day, though, some sort of unspoken agreement seems to evolve between all the guys to leave Silva be, to go easy on him. Silva appears to decide to return the favor. Pablo never sees him tackle too hard or push or shove. Of course, Silva doesn’t need to do any of those things to steal the ball. And, what with the rest of the team treating Silva like he’s Pablo’s Mama’s very best, most fragile china, Silva ends up with the ball a lot. 

Pablo’s pretty sure the mister is starting to notice. 

Pablo seems to be the exception to Silva’s restraint. With Pablo, Silva fights and scraps, in part, because that’s the only way Pablo’s giving up the ball. Pablo tackles Silva the same way he does the rest of his teammates and Silva returns the favor leaving his marks on Pablo’s body even as Pablo does the same to his. 

Pablo really doesn’t mind the way Silva fights and scraps with him. He just takes it. Just rides it out when Silva digs his elbow into Pablo’s ribs or when Silva uses the slam of his body to get Pablo off the ball and out of his way. He even finds himself wanting to smile when Silva doesn’t hold anything back when he tackles Pablo. Maybe it’s because, when he’s battling away with Pablo, Silva looks so fiercely alive, in a way he only does during games and here in training with Pablo--only Pablo. 

Sometimes, Silva will get the ball off of Pablo and then give Pablo this brilliant, triumphant smile. That smile, it almost--almost--makes Pablo not mind so much that he’s just lost the ball. He starts to think of that smile as his--as something that Silva saves just for him. And the longer the team carries on treating Silva like he’s going to break if they so much as breathe on him wrong, the more Pablo starts to think of his training battles with Silva as something else that Silva saves just for him, something else that is his and his alone. 

One day in training, after Pablo’s dumped Silva onto the ground and come away with the ball, the mister calls out, “Very good, Pablo.” Pablo nods in acknowledgment and keeps running towards the goal. 

In the next training game, Silva abandons his restraint and slides into Vinnie feet first barely, just barely, nicking the ball. It shouldn’t really be enough to bring Vinnie down but it does, maybe, Pablo thinks, because Vinnie’s just so surprised by it. Vinnie lands right on top of Silva.

The whole team just stops and stares. For a moment, an odd hush descends, it’s like everyone is holding their breath, waiting to see what happens next. Then Vinnie starts to laugh. He laughs and laughs and so does Silva. Vinnie pushes himself up off of Silva and up off the ground. Then Vinnie offers Silva a hand and helps him up. He smacks Silva’s back and says, loudly enough for everyone to hear, “We should play you in defense.” Silva just smiles.

“Enough,” the mister snaps. He sounds irritated but he has a little smile on his face when he says, “Back to work, back to the game.” 

The game descends into a kind of free-for-all, the goal of which appears to be to find out who can tackle the hardest. Silva’s right there in the midst of it all. He’s smiling and there’s a familiar fierce look on his face. Pablo knows that look. He sees it every time he and Silva clatter together in training. The mister lets them go at it for a while but, after Nigel clocks Johnson hard enough with his elbow that Johnson starts to bleed, he puts a stop to it. 

At the end of training, Silva’s smiling and happy, like he’d just scored a hat trick on his debut, instead of having just spent the afternoon being kicked up and down the field by his own teammates. 

Pablo watches Silva in the dressing room. Silva’s still smiling. He’s also covered in bruises. Pablo wonders which ones are the ones he left, which are his marks on Silva’s skin. Pablo has become accustomed to being the only one to leave behind marks on Silva’s skin. Now he can’t even tell which ones are his. He realizes, with a sickening twist of his stomach, that it bothers him. It bothers him that he can’t just look at Silva and know which marks are his. It bothers him that other people’s marks are in the way confusing the issue. Pablo forces himself to look away because, what kind of person is he, being bothered by that kind of thing. 

It’s just that Pablo had really become attached to the notion that he was the only one to battle with Silva on the training pitch, that it was something that Silva did just with him. But now, right there on Silva’s body, is the evidence that it’s something Pablo has to share with everyone else. To Pablo’s shock he really doesn’t want to share. Even though it’s for the best, for Silva and for everyone else, Pablo finds he doesn’t care, he just feels like something’s been snatched away from him. 

Silva walks by and pats Pablo’s shoulder. “Today was good, wan’t it?”

Pablo nods absently. “Yeah, sure.” 

The next day in training Pablo tackles Silva harder and more recklessly than he usually does. Then he does it again. After the second time, Silva gives him a questioning, almost hurt, look but he doesn’t say anything. Pablo can’t stand to see that look on Silva’s face but that’s not enough to stop him from doing it a third time.

When they stop to take a break, Vinnie grabs Pablo’s arm and says quietly, “We get it, okay. We were-- It was stupid. But Zaba, you need to stop, to go easier.” 

Pablo wants to say it’s not about that, that it’s not about anything. Except that it is about something. It’s just that he doesn’t know what that something is. He shrugs off Vinnie’s hand. “Yeah, sure, fine.” 

Only minutes later, though, when Pablo finds himself tangling with Silva over the ball he pulls and pushes and elbows and claws like Silva’s someone he hates instead of someone who he’d like to call friend. Silva stomps hard on Pablo’s foot and steals the ball, bounding away with it. 

Later, in the dressing room, when Pablo notices Silva staring at him with a bewildered look on his face, Pablo hesitates, then makes his way to Silva’s side. When Pablo stops next to Silva, Silva pulls away from him. He doesn’t let Pablo into his space the way he usually does. 

For a moment, Pablo just stares at Silva. There’s a fresh bruise on Silva’s arm, just below his elbow. Pablo reaches out and brushes his fingers across it. “I’m sorry, I--” He stops because he’s not sure exactly what he’s apologizing for. 

Pablo’s fascinated by the look of the bruise on Silva’s skin, by the way Silva’s skin feels under his fingers. He wonders if he left this bruise or if someone else did. He wants for it to be his bruise--his mark. It’s a wanting beyond reason, beyond his own understanding. Without thinking, he presses down on the bruise. “Pablo, Pablo.” Silva’s voice is unsubstantial and shaky--like a sigh. 

Pablo drops his hand. “I’m sorry.” 

Pablo glances towards Silva’s face. Silva’s eyes are wide, his lips are parted. There’s just a hint of a flush on his cheeks. He almost looks like he-- “Pablo.” He makes Pablo’s name sound like a plea and Pablo wishes he knew what Silva was asking for. There’s only one thing he can think of and it can’t be that, can’t be--

Pablo reaches out and pushes his fingers against Silva’s arm, pushes against the bruise. This time Silva does sigh, choked off and low. “You--” Pablo wraps his hand around Silva’s arm, covering the bruise. “You, you like that?” He’s startled by the realization, the burst of clarity, that tells him that the answer to his question is almost definitely yes. 

Silva doesn’t say anything. “Silva, David--” Pablo squeezes Silva’s arm and Silva’s eyes flutter closed. “Tell me, please,” Pablo says, “do you?” 

Silva opens his eyes. “Sometimes, yes.” His voice is low and breathy. The sound of it makes Pablo ache--ache for something that just he can’t quite put into words. 

Pablo needs more than that. He needs to know if Silva would sigh and plead like this for anyone. Would he do the same if Vinnie or Nigel or Johnson pressed their fingers to his bruises. Pablo squeezes Silva’s arm again, harder this time. “With me? You want this with me? You--” He hesitates then adds, “Me, you want me?”

Silva makes a low, shuddery sound and nods. He reaches up and covers Pablo’s hand with his own. “Yes,” he says, his voice quiet and sure and maybe a touch desperate, “Yes, I want this and yes I want you.” 

“Come--” Pablo stumbles over the word. “Come with me. Come home with me.”

“Okay,” Silva says. Then he smiles, that brilliant, triumphant smile that he saves just for Pablo. Seeing that smile on Silva’s face, it eases something inside of Pablo, something he didn’t even know needed to be eased.

Later, after Pablo has Silva spread out in his bed, after Pablo’s left new and different kinds of marks on Silva’s skin, he decides that it doesn’t matter that there are other marks on Silva’s body. It doesn’t matter because Pablo can trace his fingers across his own marks. He can run his mouth over them and taste them. Most importantly he can know with certainty that they are his.


End file.
